Source: WENN

If your panties are still in a bunch over the way Will and Jada Smith live in holy open matrimony, you might as well sit tight, because this latest detail about their approach to parenting is likely to get you riled up all over again. By now we’ve heard umpteenth explanations for why Willow can change her hair color every other day and Jaden can jet set out of the country with one of the Kardashians, but it seems the Smiths may be thinking about giving their eldest even more freedom than he already has. Essentially, at 14 years old he may become his own “man” and head of household.

In an interview with Metro New York, the father and son pair discuss their new film together “After Earth” and inevitably the conversation turned to Will’s parenting style, which seems to be much more hands off from the character he plays in the new flick. Here’s a bit of the Q&A:

When was the last time you were punished, Jaden?

W: We don’t do punishment. The way that we deal with our kids is, they are responsible for their lives. Our concept is, as young as possible, give them as much control over their lives as possible and the concept of punishment, our experience has been — it has a little too much of a negative quality. So when they do things — and you know, Jaden, he’s done things — you can do anything you want as long as you can explain to me why that was the right thing to do for your life.

J: It works pretty well.

But most teenagers aren’t naturally introspective. Jaden, do you find yourself asking yourself deep questions about your behavior and acting accordingly?

J: Yeah. Other teenagers go to parties and sometimes I be like, “Why am I here right now?” And most of the time, I just leave right then and there. Some things I don’t like to do, that other teenagers do. Everyone thinks that since you make movies, you go to parties, and I like to party, but not normal teenage parties.

Jaden, what happens when you’re 18 and Will kicks you out of the house.

J: We’ll probably work together ‘till he retires and he probably won’t retire.

W: [Laughs] No we’ve been talking about, he’s been thinking about becoming an emancipated minor.

J: Just thoughts that pop into my head.

They made a movie about that — a girl divorced her parents.

J: Really!

Rent that, get some tips.

W: [Laughs] No, it’s not like that. More the idea that, I want him to have as much command and freedom if he is willing to accept responsibility. Those are two concepts that are inexorably bound. So he’s a very responsible young man so he’s entitled to the maximum freedom. [To Jaden] I said “inexorably.” You heard that? Someone Google that for Jaden.

So, it’s not like Jaden will be out on the streets under a viaduct with a sign begging for food if he’s emancipated, but at 14, there’s still so much time for him to be an adult. Why the rush? As a matter of fact, he’ll legally be one in a little over three years after he turns 15 this July. While I absolutely think children should be rewarded with freedom when they are responsible, the responsibility that comes along with being an adult isn’t always rewarding. Jaden should enjoy the last few years left of being a carefree child.

What do you think about allowing a 14-year-old to emancipate himself from you if he’s responsible?

Source: http://www.abc15.com

This story about an Arizona principal’s choice of punishment kind of slipped through the pages of the blogosphere but it bears noting and repeating.

According to the local Arizona ABC news affiliate:

“Two East Valley high school students were forced to hold hands in front of their classmates as punishment this week for fighting. Now that punishment is drawing criticism.
The students at Westwood High in Mesa were apparently given the option to hold hands instead of being suspended. “Kids were laughing at them and calling them names asking, ‘Are you gay?’” said student Brittney Smyers, who saw the punishment play out at the school earlier this week.

“It was funny,” said student Mickey Shull. “I’ve been in ROTC and it’s no different than some of the stuff you have to do there. It works.” Most students at the school thought the punishment was better than getting suspended. They acknowledged it was humiliating, but thought it would teach them a lesson.”

While the community and most of his students were behind the school administrator, who is said to be in his first year at this high school, one of the male students told the reporter that he was so embarrassed that he wanted to yell at them, but couldn’t so he put his head down in shame. The school district administrators said that they do not approve of the tactic and will be investigating it further.  And if you ask me, rightly so. I mean the boys certainly did get a lesser punishment but it’s probably not the lesson we want to teach the next generation.

Did it get to the root of why these boys were misbehaving? Or was the sole intent to shame and humiliate them into “good behavior”? And let’s not forget all the unchecked homophobia. This is one of the reasons why I’m becoming more and more trepidatious about these public shaming tactics used by some adults as corrective punishments for children. I don’t think the principal should lose his job over it.  In this instance, I am sure the principal meant well and probably was trying to teach the boys how to interact in more loving, non-violent ways. The problem isn’t the hand holding, it was having the boys sit on display as their classmates encircled them, laughing, mocking and making statements that could be misconstrued as homophobic. What could have been a teachable moment for the entire lot of children became another lesson on the subtle ways in which we as a society condone hazing – if not bullying.

Likewise, having kids hold hands as a form of punishment or consequence to bad behavior sort of reinforces the notions that there is something negative about not just homosexuality, but straight men and boys being affection and kind with one another.  This is important in an era where hyper-aggression, particularly in the media, is the norm in all of American society and anything remotely “feminine” including hand holding, is considered weak or less than masculine. Shouldn’t the message we should be sending every single day that it is okay for men in any circumstances to embrace and show affection?

Hopefully there is some discussion with staff and students, in particular the ones who pointed and laughed. If anything, I say kudos to the young men in this story, who were secure enough in themselves to hold hands in the face of ridicule and shame. Because everybody knows, a behind whipping by mom and/or dad for getting suspended from school is ten times worse than what ignorant stuff your classmates have to say – unless you were one of those kids, who never had to fear the wrath of your parents. In that instance, you too have to wonder about any students, who may decide to take the suspension over temporarily looking awkward.

Source: parentdish.co.uk

Just like Trick Daddy, I love the kids and I truly believe we need to do all we can to protect them. But this punishment for Cleveland woman, Shena Hardin, seemed to take things a little too far. Hardin was caught on tape, driving on a sidewalk trying to avoid a school-bus stop sign. As you know when school buses are unloading, traffic in both ways must stop and wait until the children have safely crossed the street. But apparently, Hardin couldn’t wait. So instead, she drove up onto the sidewalk passing the bus. Before she could even get to the intersection, Hardin was pulled over by the police. The whole incident was caught on tape and made worse by the fact that the sidewalk she drove on happened to be located right in front of a daycare center. It was all bad. I’m not trying to argue that she should have done it or that she shouldn’t have been punished for it.

But Hardin’s punishment seemed excessive, bordering on sadistic.

In addition to the $250 fine and a suspended license for 30 days, Hardin was also sentenced to wearing a sign that reads “Only an idiot drives on the sidewalk to avoid a school but,” for two days.  

Now, I agree with the fine and the suspended license; but the punishment should have ended there. What is the purpose of making a grown woman wear this sign, aside from embarrassing her?

What do you think about this story, was this punishment too far?

Over the weekend, I watched a video of a father dishing out some “tough love” to his son via a YouTube video.

In the video, the father, who is behind the camera in the almost 3 minute video, can be heard ribbing on his son’s style of dress, particularly his skinny jeans, which for reasons only they know, is all the rage now with the youngins nowadays. Standing with his arms stretched out in front of him in his smedium jeans, which barely covered his behind, the son is commanded by his father to perform all sorts of maneuvers including squats and back bends -none of which he could do successfully because of the tightness of his jeans.

As soon as I finished laughing my A$$ off – quite literally – at the father mockingly chiding his son about his inability to walk fast, I began to feel a certain level of uneasiness. Both embarrassment and a ting of awkwardness for me and for this nameless child. I mean, questionable fashion taste aside, did his crime of wearing extra tight jeans really warrant the humiliation from voyeuristic eyes over the internet?

Over the last few years, I have watched similar versions of castigation play out on the internet. A couple of years ago, there was the video of the dad sarcastically teasing his son about his self-inflicted jacked up haircut.  A few months back, a video of a father shooting his daughter’s laptop for inappropriate comments on Facebook went viral with over 33 millions views.  The videos are amusing and I’m sure definitely arouses a spirit of camaraderie from frustrated parents of wayward children across the globe. However as parents explore other creative alternatives to grandma’s switch and time-outs; are they dishing out punishments which teeter on the line of cruel and unusual?

Consider these examples: One mother, clearly disturbed about her underage daughter posting pictures of herself drinking on Facebook, made her upload a picture of her crying and holding a sign, via Instagram, saying “Since I want to post photos of me holding liquor, I am obviously not ready for social media and will be taking a hiatus until I learn what I should and should not post!” One father, fed up with his 15 year old daughter’s “mean girl” ways, decided that the appropriate discipline would be to make her hold a sign on the intersection “I have a bad attitude. I disrespect people who try to help me.” And a mother, who was at the end of her rope with her thieving son, made him hold a sign admitting to his crime after nothing else seemed to work. As told to the local news station, the mother said that, “I don’t care about the comments. It’s not about everybody else; it’s about him learning that stealing (is) not right, at all.”

Good lesson, questionable approach.

If there’s one phrase almost any black child can recall being said to them during childhood, it’s you better quit doing x, y, or Z before I embarrass you. Nobody wants to be embarrassed, and when your parent gives you a warning like that, you know they’re going to make good on it. But for some reason that sentiment has seemed to tip-toe out of homes and into the classroom, with embarrassment tactics being the go-to solution for teachers, particularly when it comes to black students and it’s something I have a hard time accepting.

I should start out by mentioning I’m not a fan of negative reinforcement. I recognize for some people it works, but it’s an approach that has never sat well with me so I have an inherent bias toward some of the situations I’ve come across in the news lately. Two days ago, I wrote about Bria Persley and how she was told by a teacher to sit her nappy-headed self down. You can argue all you want that nappy was a descriptive adjective and one would only find it offensive if they had some sort of ill personal feelings toward having coarse hair but 99 percent of us know that no such phrases like sit your curly- or stringy-haired self down exist in the realm of English colloquialisms and that teacher said what she did to embarrass that girl. We’ve probably all heard someone tell another person to sit their black a** down and while the person referencing may have in fact been of that race, the word black was thrown in their not as a description but as a taunt. This is no different.

A few moments ago, I came across another story of ninth grader Dionne Evans who apparently forgot her binder for school recently. The teacher attempted to teach her a lesson by telling the student to come to the front of the class and she was asked if she’d ever seen “Bridesmaids,” after which the teacher reportedly began acting out one of the scenes from the film in which one of the characters tries to “knock some sense” into her friend by hitting her on the head. When the girl and her mother complained to the school, the teacher wrote a letter of apology, saying:

“I want to tell you how truly sorry I am. My intention was never to hurt you or embarrass you. Rather, I was trying to reach out to you and help you focus on your school work and motivate you.

“Even though I thought my intentions were honorable, they did not come out that way and for that I am so very sorry. Please know that I feel terrible about causing you pain and would like the opportunity to make it right.”

Teach needs more people. Though I can see her somewhat comically hitting the girl over the head, how she considers that reaching out and being motivational is beyond me. Where is the lesson in that? She knew it would be embarrassing despite backtracking and claiming that wasn’t her intent, and I’m sure she thought that the girl would never forget her binder again because she wouldn’t want to be shamed in front on another occasion.

From reading comments on each story, there seems to be two main responses—outrage over the teacher’s behavior or support for administrators because if these kids were somehow troublemakers they deserved whatever came to them. The latter I can’t get behind. Children most definitely should have consequences when they don’t handle their responsibilities in school. We called those demerits and detention when I was coming up. What bothers me is I’m not only finding these stories because I’m perusing black sites, I search MSN, Yahoo, and other mainstream outlets and I’m not finding instances of white children being berated like this to learn some sort of lesson. And though I’m willing to lend some of that tipped scale to the fact that black people can have a tendency to look for racism in things that might not really be an instance of such, I get the feeling when these stories hit that our children are being treated like this in class because they’re already thought to be throw-away kids. This theory supported by studies that already show minority students are given less feedback than others.

I may be a tad sensitive to these things, but in my opinion grade school and even high school are tough years and not periods where liberties should be taken to belittle student’s self-esteem. The hair comment in particular is wrought with all sorts of confidence-damaging implications that even most grown women can’t get past today. No one should be allowed to demean someone’s physical appearance because of any transgression they committed. The point of school is to prepare children for the “real-world” but no company in the world could get away with an executive speaking to an employee like that and it shouldn’t fly in school either.

I’m not saying that children don’t need to be taught lessons but the subtle and sometimes overtly prejudice ways our children are being disciplined is not acceptable. For Brea to be dismissed from the school because her mother complained about the teacher is baffling to me. Had her response warranted police intervention or something of the sort, I could see the expulsion being necessary but how could you not expect this mother to be irate at the teacher’s actions and the principle’s response about mean kids needing to be taught a lesson. If parents don’t stand up and advocate for their kids who will?

It doesn’t matter if kids used to be spanked, paddled, or put over one’s knee in front of the class to teach them a lesson. Those days are gone and the embarrassment tactics previously used shouldn’t be replaced with the one’s discussed here. I can’t imagine the stresses teachers are facing in with unruly students in overcrowded classrooms but at the end of the day, we are still talking about children. If these teachers can’t handle the pressures like an adult without resorting to demeaning tactics they are the ones who should be embarrassed.

Brande Victorian is a blogger and culture writer in New York City. Follower her on Twitter at @be_vic.

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In this digital age, everything is changing. And I do mean everything, even the way we discipline our children. Earlier this month, a mother of two boys decided to sell her sons’ spinning tops, called Beyblades, as punishment for destroying the bathtub while they were using it as a battle ground. She listed the spinning tops on EBay.

Although the opening bid was $69 dollars, it quickly skyrocketed to $999,999 before it was taken down. The mother assumed it was a hoax.

Get the additional details behind the story here.

Was this a good idea for a punishment or is it too humiliating for the children?

“Spare the rod, spoil the child,” is the proverb that most parents turn to when justifying a form of discipline that is most likely heavily influenced by memories of their own upbringing.  You were “whooped” when you were a child and you turned out alright, right?  But in fact this quote isn’t completely correct.  The truth is any success you’ve experienced as an adult has less to do with a rod to the rear than you think.

The old adage is actually an adaptation from King Solomon’s Book of Proverbs and states: “He that spareth his rod, hateth his son: but he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes (Proverbs 13:24)” When translated exactly, this means that if you choose not to use corporal punishment then you must hate your children, but if you love them then you should hit them, at least sometimes.  The truth is that if there is anything that discipline is NOT about, it’s hate.

Effective discipline begins with a true understanding of the difference between punishment and discipline.  Punishment is a negative consequence for inappropriate behavior.  It’s often a first resort because it’s a quick and easy response to penalize improper conduct.  It’s much easier and quicker to yell or slap a child that is playing in the street or acting out instead of sitting down and explaining why that behavior was wrong.  Punishment paints the parent as a harsh dictator rather than as a respected authority. It’s important to assess why you’re disciplining your child.  Is the occasional cuss out really teaching your child why the behavior is wrong, or is it simply cathartic for you?  If your child isn’t the only one who ends up throwing a tantrum, the only thing you’re teaching is that concern is best expressed as anger.  Children who are punished learn that the ones that love you the most are also the ones to hurt you and that violence is the first alternative when things don’t go as they should.

(Color Lines) — The day bullies dared to gang up on a lone teenager smack atop Jimmy Smith’s meticulously kept lawn, his reflexes kicked in. “Sanctuary over here!” he hollered, dashing out of his Chicago home and firing his Beretta revolver skyward. “Ain’t nobody dying up in my yard today. Let that boy go.” The attack ended, the attackers high-tailing it off Smith’s property. “I was determined to stop what was going down,” he says of that assault 30 years ago.

Read  More…

(Color Lines) — The day bullies dared to gang up on a lone teenager smack atop Jimmy Smith’s meticulously kept lawn, his reflexes kicked in. “Sanctuary over here!” he hollered, dashing out of his Chicago home and firing his Beretta revolver skyward. “Ain’t nobody dying up in my yard today. Let that boy go.” The attack ended, the attackers high-tailing it off Smith’s property. “I was determined to stop what was going down,” he says of that assault 30 years ago.

Read  More…